22

I knew the desk sergeant, so he gave me no hassle, just a clip-on badge that authorized me to wander the station.

Mooney was in his office, and he wasn’t alone. Much to my lack of delight, Walter Jamieson was with him. I gritted my teeth, knocked, and strolled in. The air was smoke-filled, evidence of a recent meeting unless Mooney had fallen off the wagon. I inhaled deeply. I gave it up a long time ago, but I still get a rush from the secondhand stuff.

Jamieson didn’t exactly snarl at me. Mooney cracked a smile, not a great smile, but an effort nonetheless. Jamieson was perched on the edge of the guest chair. Mooney sat in the chair behind the desk, and that took care of the seating facilities and most of the available space. I leaned my backside against a wall and slid down until I was practically on the floor. I used to sit like that in Mooney’s office a lot.

Mooney stared at me hard, lifted his hand, and touched his cheekbone. “Want to swear out a complaint?” he asked.

So much for my attempts at bruise camouflage via makeup.

“Don’t let me interrupt you,” I said as Jamieson steamed.

“Mr. Jamieson was leaving,” Mooney said pointedly.

“I was not,” Jamieson denied.

“Look,” Mooney said, “we’re cooperating on this case, but cooperation means you file the right forms and we send you the relevant data. It does not mean I give you material before I get it, okay?”

From my seat on the floor I could stare up at the map on the back of the door, at the four pushpins clustered near the Fens.

Jamieson made as if to start a new wave of protest, but he kept glancing down at me and stopping. I guess he was unwilling to share his valuable thoughts with an outsider. “What is she doing here?” he finally blurted.

“Well,” Mooney said, “I hope she’s come to take me out to dinner. After that …” He gave an eloquent shrug.

Jamieson blushed and tightened his lips disapprovingly. He said, “I need copies of the reports for our files.”

“I’ll send them over,” Mooney said.

“I’d like to take them with me,” Jamieson said.

“I’ll send them.”

“Quit stalling me, Lieutenant.”

“I can give you everything we’ve got in a teaspoon,” Mooney said through clenched teeth. “Listen up. The FBI hasn’t come up with more than fifty similar crimes yet. The medical examiner says the women were all killed in a similar manner. I gave you that hot flash before. The M.E. can’t say they were killed by the same man, he can’t say not by the same man. I can tell you they were killed by the same man. How do I know? With my gut. We’re going through mountains of missing-persons reports, from Kansas City, from Oregon, for chrissake, but so far we got no matches.”

Jamieson consulted a small wire-ringed notebook. “Were the women raped?” he asked.

Mooney shrugged his shoulders.

“Drugs?”

“No evidence.”

“How did the killer get the body from that apartment to the park? Without anybody seeing him?”

“He’s lucky and smart. The FBI’s got a word for these guys. They call them ‘organized’ killers, and they’re a bitch to catch. There’s an alleyway behind those buildings on Westland. He must have pulled a car close to the back door, wrapped the body in a sheet or a plastic tarp. Burned the tarp or stuck it in a dumpster. I’ve got guys looking. D.A.’s got guys looking. State police are looking.”

“What about dental records?” Jamieson insisted.

“We have the remains. You get me some records to try a match with, and I’ll get you the best damned forensic dentist you ever saw.”

“These women,” the INS man said angrily. “If they’re illegal, they come here with nothing. No identification. No jobs. No family. No dental charts. No one to file a report when they don’t show up.”

“Probably,” I said sweetly, “they don’t expect to get killed. Inconsiderate of them.”

Jamieson glared. I watched the pushpins on the map.

Mooney broke the silence. “Anyway, we’re trying two dental matchups that aren’t going to work. We’re not doing them because of interagency pressure, we’re doing them because we’re thorough, got that? Very thorough.

“The thing I want to tell you is that the guy is going to be very hard to catch. Because he knows a lot of the same stuff cops know. Christ, he could be a cop. He’s like that Atlanta child-murderer guy. He washes up afterward. He’s careful. When we find him, he’s going to have a library full of books on forensic medicine, stuff like that. Because this guy is not dumb and he’s not ignorant, and he seems to know what he’s doing—if anybody who does this kind of shit knows what he’s doing. You want to write that down?”

“I want the reports,” Jamieson said stubbornly.

“Me too. How about you answer some questions? Why haven’t I gotten a full set of prints to go with that green card? A set of documents? You gotta have prints, a medical report, a letter from a bank, from an employer, all that crap on file. At least I’d know if one of these stiffs is really named Manuela Estefan.”

“I told you we’re working on it.”

Mooney got to his feet slowly. He’s a big man, and when he stood, the tiny room got even smaller. For a minute I thought Jamieson was going to stand and challenge him, but he shrank back in his chair, and muttered, “First thing in the morning, then.” He didn’t say good-bye to me when he fled.

Mooney looked at me after a moment’s silence. “Shit,” he said, “I feel like the schoolyard bully.”

“How long’s he been here?” I asked.

“All day,” Mooney said. “He wants to move in.”

“Mooney,” I said, “it’ll be justifiable homicide. I’ll testify.”

“Take me out to dinner?” he said.

I was suddenly ravenous. “Sure, let’s go,” I said, thinking only of my stomach.

“You mean it?” I could tell from his eyes that he hadn’t given up. Sam or no Sam. Gorgeous INS guys be damned.

“Yeah,” I said less than graciously, “but it’s not a date or anything.”

“My treat,” he said.

I wouldn’t go till he agreed to split the bill.